The basis of Law – A monotheist viewpoint

The basis of law is love

Laws are rules that bind all people living in a community. Laws protect our general safety and ensure our rights as citizens against abuses by other people, by organizations, and by the government itself.  We have laws to help provide for our general safety.  These exist at the local, state and national levels. We can ask the question, where do laws come from? In the United States, the Constitution is the ultimate source of the law. However, it was never designed to address every specific legal question. Within the boundaries of the Constitution, there are two primary sources of law, common law and statutory law. Common law comes from the judicial branch. Though the courts do not pass laws, they do interpret them. This means that the judiciary bases their legal decisions on what is written in the Constitution, and on previous court rulings in similar cases. This is a process called stare decisis which in Latin means “let the decision stand.” While in the case of Statutory law, Statutes are laws created by the legislative branch through the lawmaking process. Statutes are written, discussed, argued and voted on in Congress or in the legislature of a state. The courts then apply and interpret these statutes on a case by case basis.

Any law, morality, rules and regulation not based on love is practically useless and without purpose. Morality, rules, regulations and laws are necessary in a world containing more than one person. Let’s imagine for a moment that we have the earth, lifeless and dead, floating in a lifeless and dead universe. There are only mountains, rocks, gullies, winds, and rain, but no one anywhere to make judgments as to good and evil. In such a world would good and evil exist? Would it make any moral difference if a rock rolled down a hill or if it didn’t? Richard Taylor in his book, Good and Evil, has argued effectively that a “distinction between good and evil could not even theoretically be drawn in a world that we imagined to be devoid of all life.”

Now, following Taylor, let’s add some beings to this planet. However, let us make them perfectly rational and devoid of all emotion, totally free of all purposes, needs, or desires. Like computers, they simply register what is going on, but they make no moves to ensure their own survival or avoid their own destruction. Do good and evil exist now? Again, there is no theoretical way in which they can. These beings don’t care what goes on; they merely observe. And thus, they have no rationale for declaring a thing good or evil. Nothing matters to them and, since they are the only beings in the universe, nothing matters at all. However, the author of this piece differs from Richard Taylor’s book, Good and Evil, in that, this planet Earth and the universe did not come into existence from nothing, or from a random big bang theory and its preceding chaos. Furthermore, human beings are not computerlike living organisms devoid of emotions. Therefore, a Source is responsible for the existence of the universe and its content, including human beings. And the moment that we have more than one human being, then there is the need for a set of parameters guiding relationships between one and the other(s). in addition, when the Source is considered as a or the Being, and the first human being or man is also considered as a being, then there has to be a set of parameters guiding the relationship between the two. Hence the need for morality and in turn rule and regulations as a framework to guide relationships. All moral values would be arbitrary if it weren’t for God; God was the one who made good things good and bad things bad; and our knowledge of good and evil, right and wrong, moral and immoral must be based on the absolute moral standards established in heaven.

Mutual respect between one being and the other, honour, fairness, equitability, selflessness, wellness, kindness, patience, protection, growth, understanding and trust, are all qualities and attributes that stem out of love. And love is a virtue, action or state that requires more than one Being, for it to be manifested. In order for it to be shown or exhibited, at least two or more Beings are required. When these virtues, qualities and attributes are reflected in any rule or guideline, then there is peaceful coexistence of all parties. Not only being man and man, but also between man and God. According to the theist, the lawgiver is God, the laws of God that form the basis of most societal morals and ethics, can on a hypothetical perspective be considered as a contract between two parties, God on one hand, and man on the other hand. Subsequently, in the case of dispute, an analysis or determination would be made to ascertain, who has violated the terms and conditions of the contract. Irrespective of whether an individual is a theist or atheist or humanist, it still remains that rules and regulations presents a set of parameters or framework for human to human or Being to Being relationships. And the framework that lasts, is one based on Love. As our Lord Jesus Christ stated in Mathew 22:37-40; “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

(References: Fred Edwords; https://americanhumanist.org/what-is-humanism/human-basis-laws-ethics/ American Humanist Association “Good without a God”

https://judiciallearningcenter.org/law-and-the-rule-of-law/

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+22&version=NIV)